I’m fond of monasteries. I don’t know what it is…I think they’re fascinating. In fact…something that might be surprising…I actually considered becoming a Benedictine Monk when I was discerning the priesthood. In the end my personality wasn’t exactly geared toward the monastic life. But I do love monasteries and I love what they teach us.

Now it’s expected that every priest of our diocese goes on 5 retreat every year. And a retreat is best experienced in silence. So I like going to monasteries. And over the past few years I’ve retreated in silence at different monasteries here in the US. Our Lady of Clear Creek…a monastery southeast of Tulsa…of all places…where French Benedictines from the medieval abbey of Fontombault moved just fifteen years ago to bringing their 1000 year old tradition to rural Oklahoma. St. Meinrad Archabbey in the farming valleys of southern Indiana where in 1854 german speaking monks from Our Lady of Einsedeln in Switzerland established a monastery to bring Catholicism to the German farmers of the area. St. Joseph Abbey in Covington Louisiana…just across Lake Ponchatrain from New Orleans…a perfect place for retreat…it’s like Medieval Europe mixed with southern gentility mixed with church Disneyland.
If you’ve ever been to a monastery…that’s kind of what monasteries are like. The monks sing ancient prayers seven times a day and…particularly at Benedictine Abbeys…it’s usually quite beautiful as they process in and out two by two with flowing hooded black robes as if time has stood still for 8 centuries.

Now whenever I go to these monasteries for retreat…after a couple of days of winding down and getting into the rhythm of the monastic schedule…which starts usually with early morning prayer at 5AM in the abbey church…I begin noticing things that I normally might not. Benedictines are very purposeful…just the way they walk around the abbey grounds…the way they bow to the altar when they come into the abbey church…the way eat their meals in silence listening to leccio divina from scripture or some medieval theologian…the way they open doors…the way they read the readings at mass…the way they work the fields of the abbey farm…everything they do…even the littlest things…seems to have a particular purpose in their lives. In other words…they don’t do things accidentally. They don’t pray accidentally…they don’t genuflect accidentally…they don’t work in the monastery laundry accidentally…they don’t bake bread accidentally…they don’t take care of the gardens around the monastery accidentally. It’s all very purposeful. And the result is a life completely aware of the meaning of everything around them. And one of the most purposeful things in Benedictine life is the monastic living arrangement. Each monk lives in a single room called a cell. It’s usually pretty small and quite simple. A bed…a crucifix on the wall…a desk with a wooden chair…a lamp…and a few books. And this room…the monk’s Cell and the Abbey grounds is where he lives…for the rest of his life.

Now I admit it…it’s pretty extreme. It goes against almost everything that our culture tells us. To live in a cell is the opposite of “be all you can be” or “never settle for anything but the best” or “experience all of what this life offers”. I actually might have even become a monk if not for a life confined to the monastic cell. But as I watch these monks on my retreats I begin to understand the profound depth of their simple lives. And what I see has everything to do with this gospel and you and me.

Whoever wishes to come after me, must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it.
The Monks Cell is the room where he sleeps, prays, reads, writes, paints, whatever…but his cell at a deeper…symbolic level…is his vocation. He’s called to live his life in this cell. So in a sense the cell is his mission. It’s part of who he is. The Cell…in monastic spiritualty…is his calling…his vocation…his duty…his daily commitment. I’m sure that there are days when the monks are irritated by the life they’ve chosen. But they stay right on that edge…day in and day out…always returning to their cell.

I came across an essay on monks while I was sitting one night in one the Abbey guesthouses. In this essay there was a quote about monks that went this way: Every time you leave your cell, you come back less a person. It continued to say of monks…go to your cell and your cell will teach you everything you need to know. Stay inside your cell…it’s your vocation…it’s your commitment…stay inside your promises…your duties…your obligations…and there you will become whole again. In other words…when a person…in this case the monk…leaves his God given…TRUE…vocation to seek out something novel or something entertaining or something self-fulfilling he actually moves farther away from who he really is…but when he comes back to his cell…when he returns daily to the place of duty…commitment…obedience…simplicity…basic-ness…small-ness...he comes back closer to his most authentic identity.

Curiously it’s the very same for you me. Be faithful to your cell…be faithful to your vocation…your committments…your promises…your duties…and what you are ultimately looking for will be found…in your cell of life…in your obedience in whatever your station in life might be. But as we all know…this is very un-American…particularly un-Modern-American. People today think the answers to life’s restlessness are out there…the solutions to our deep desire for fulfillment…society tells us…are found in the movies…magazines…billboards…E Television and superbowl tailgating banter. Well they’re not…and we know it. They’re right here in our monastic cell where God calls us to remain and to be aware.

The essay on monks went on to tell the story of an Italian monk named Carlo Carretto. After he had been a monk for more than 25 years and had spent thousands of hours obediently alone in his cell…in his vow…in his vocation…in his duties and commitment to the monastery…he went to visit his elderly mother. She was a woman who had been consumed with the job of raising a large family for 50 years. And for long periods of time she had been so committed to this vocation of being a mother that she never once sought out her own dreams or aspirations. She was stuck in her vocation…confined in her commitment…dying to her dreams…and forever returning day after day to her cell. Visiting his mother that day he realized that he had spent long years in silent solitude and she had spent long years in loud activity. Yet, by his own admission, she was perhaps more aware of God’s presence in her life than he was in his. He suspected that she was more selfless than he and that she possessed a depth of soul that he could only envy. He had realized that she had done what every holy monk wants to do. She had…every day…remained in her cell…in her commitment as a wife and a mother. He had gone into his cell every day and it taught him what he needed to know. And she had gone into her cell every day and it taught her what she needed to know. This is the heart of being a monk and it’s the message of this gospel.

If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it.
So what is our cell? What’s your cell? What is my monastic cell as a diocesan priest? It’s the place where we lose our life so that we can find it. When we are faithful to our cells…our vows…our commitments…our promises…our families…our husbands…our wives…our moms and dads…our children…our jobs…our church…our neighborhoods…when we remain faithful to these commitments…as basic and as boring as they might be…we learn God’s lessons directly in our cell. Conversely, when we fight the demands of our cells…our holy duties and commitments and leave them seeking presumably more glorious experiences and destinations out there away from our cell we become somehow less than what we are supposed to be.

We’re all monks fighting the attraction of saving our lives out there in the fantastic opportunities of life. But what we really need is to go back to our cells…every day…monks in monasteries and monks in the world…Benedictines…Husbands…Trapptists…Wives…Carthusians…School Children…Cistercians…Sales People…Franciscans…School Teachers…Dominicans…Dentists. We all have cells…our everyday lives are our cells. And they teach us what we need to know if we are aware of them and if we are faithful to them. Don’t run from them…live in them. Take them up…the crosses of our monastic cells…hold them close to your soul…and follow Him. Because in our dying to self…we actually end up finding ourselves…and that’s what makes a monk holy…in the monastery and right here in the everyday world.